Description

Key Characters:

Growth Form: Perennial herbs.

Stems: Stems 1–6 dm long, 1–2 mm in diameter, loosely cespitose.

Roots:

Leaves: Leaves simple. Leaves basal, numerous and crowded. Blades variable in length, 7–30 cm long, 1–1.3 mm wide. Margins entire. Sheaths loose with wide hyaline margins prolonged into white scarious auricles up to 5 mm long. Stipules absent.

Flowers: Flowers (3–)numerous, borne singly on 1 side of rachis, in relatively compact dichasial cymes 1–7 cm long, forming less than ⅓ of plant, bracts 2–3, foliaceous, usually far exceeding inflorescence, each flower subtended by 2 bracteoles, these hyaline, triangular–ovate. Flowers bisexual (perfect). Perianth parts greenish, lanceolate, 3–4.5 mm long, apex long–acuminate, outer ones slightly reflexed at apex, inner ones with wide hyaline margins below. Stamens 6, ½ as long as perianth; anthers shorter than filaments. Pollen grains remaining in tetrads, surrounded by a common exine. Ovary superior, carpels 1.

Fruit: Capsules reddish brown; 1–celled; broadly ovoid; thin–walled; slightly beaked; ⅔ to rarely scarcely shorter than perianth. Seeds pale brown; oblong; 0.3–0.4 mm long; slightly apiculate at both ends.

Ploidy: 2n = 30; 32; 40; 80; 84

Habitat: naturalized in usually wet sites along trails; disturbed places; and pastures.

Elevation Range: 700–2,000 m.